Civic Center price twist startles Broadway fans

May 16, 2013

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Kari Schulte has been a season ticket holder at the Des Moines Civic Center for more than 20 years and has come to expect the steady increases in price. She paid $234 for the five-show Broadway subscription in 2010-11, $254 for the season after that, and $294 for the one that just finished.

So the West Des Moines retiree was shocked when she learned that next season the same seat would cost $476 — an increase of $182. That’s a hike of $728 when she adds the three extra subscriptions for her husband and parents.

“I was in disbelief at first,” she said. “But after it sank in, I was upset and very disappointed.”

Des Moines Performing Arts, which oversees the Civic Center and its programming, tinkers with prices each year, based on the particular mix of shows and prices at similar venues in other cities. It’s a complicated formula, with multiple factors.

The ticket office has set aside a higher-priced “premium” zone for certain events in the past, but this is the first year the zone applies to the entire Broadway series. The area covers about 200 seats, in the middle of rows B through M.

But the strategy isn’t just a grab for money, DMPA leaders said. Charging higher prices for the best seats allows the theater to lower prices farther back. Next season’s C section, near the rear corners, will expand to 110 seats from 80, an increase of about 38 percent. Subscriptions in the C section start at $160.

“We want to give more people who can’t afford to see the shows a chance to see them,” said Laura Sweet, DMPA vice president and chief operating officer.

Subscriptions to the Broadway shows have doubled over the last six years, to more than 12,000, thanks to hits like “Wicked” and “The Book of Mormon” and the fact that subscribers — in any section — pay at least 25 percent less per show than those who buy single tickets for similar seats. That growth is remarkable in an era when season ticket sales are declining nationwide as consumers, especially younger ones, have become less likely to plan things months in advance.

But the Broadway series is only part of the DMPA equation. Profits from blockbusters help offset the costs for school programs and more intimate events in DMPA’s Stoner and Temple theaters. Sweet pointed to recent visits from Japanese taiko drummers, a part of the Family Series, and the folk singer Arlo Guthrie, who performed in the 300-seat space at the Temple.

“That’s a lifetime experience for people,” she said. “Some events we subsidize because we think it’s important to the community, and there aren’t any other venues in town that can take those risks. It’s part of our mission.”

Still, that mission hasn’t meant much to the Broadway fans who feel as if they’re getting squeezed out of their longtime seats. Ticket office director Julia Duvall said her team tried to call everyone who would be affected by the changes, but some people were still caught off guard when the renewal notices arrived in the mail. The early renewal deadline is May 24, and the ticket office is working with those who want to move to new seats.

Duvall pointed out that the majority of subscribers will see no more than a 3 percent increase, and some people, whose seats are in the expanded C section, will actually pay less. The ticket office won’t relocate anybody without talking to him directly.

“And it’s not like we have to move them to the moon,” Sweet said. “There are great seats that are still available.”

Schulte’s subscriptions are still in limbo. The ticket office offered her two seats next to the premium zone, in row K, and another pair in the front row, which she hopes to swap for something farther back, possibly on a different night. For a while she considered paying the higher price to stay put on opening night but decided against it.

“I finally calmed down a little,” she said. “The more I thought about it, I thought, ‘This is ridiculous. I can’t live and die by those seats.’ So I’m trying to be mature about it and move on, but it’s really hard.”